Test Subject
by JMcK
Summary: Kate makes a conscious choice to put herself at risk to help the group, but the consequences may not be what she was prepared for.
1. Chapter 1

_Author's note: This idea came to me after rewatching the first episodes of season two and realizing Desmond had a huge amount of drugs that haven't been mentioned much on the show. I wrote most of it before the most recent episode aired, and as such, Charlie and Claire are still distant, and there's no mention of what Charlie found._

_By way of disclaimer: I don't own these characters, and mean no infringement. _

_This is my first Lost fic. Feedback is so very, very much appreciated. _

**Test Subject**

Claire's cry of pain was loud, anguished, difficult to listen to.

Kate cringed visibly and turned her head away.

"Okay," Jack told his patient gently, "Okay, worst is over, all right? Claire, you hear me? Now that the bone is set, it all gets easier from here on in, I promise."

Claire barely heard him, and Kate wandered a few steps away, shaken.

It shouldn't be like this. They lived in too dangerous a place to not have some form of pain control.

"How bad is it?" A tentative voice from just behind her startled Kate, and she turned to find a hooded Charlie, looking weary.

"She's gonna be okay," Kate told him, forcing a small smile. "She's gonna be fine."

"But she's in pain," Charlie pointed out, sounding pained himself, and Kate nodded reluctantly.

"Yeah. Yeah, Charlie, she's in pain."

Charlie glanced down at his hands, and seemed about to ask something, then changed his mind and wandered away.

Kate stared out at the water for a long moment, far enough away from the crowd that only vague murmurs reached her ears.

She wondered about an idea that had come to her weeks ago.

It seemed more than a little bit risky.

Maybe it was crazy.

But maybe it was necessary, too.

Kate took a deep breath and started making her way toward the hatch.

Jack would return there as soon as he had Claire settled for the night, and when he did, she'd be waiting, and she wouldn't take 'no' for an answer.

…

It was almost an hour later that Jack finally walked tiredly into the central living area of the hatch.

He found Kate dozing on the couch and smiled softly despite himself. He let himself watch her for a moment, calmed by the gentle rise and fall of her chest.

At least someone was resting comfortably. He couldn't say the same for Claire.

He tried to move quietly as he set about preparing a meal for himself. When Sayid had come running up to him earlier in the day, shouting that Claire was hurt, he had immediately jumped into doctor mode, forgetting about himself and setting to work taking care of her.

Calm now, he couldn't ignore his empty stomach.

A few minutes passed in near silence as the oven heated up, and it was a comfortable quiet, the only sound that of Kate's faint, even breathing.

Jack nearly cursed out loud when his elbow bumped an empty water bottle, and it fell to the floor and bounced a few times, hollow plastic bangs and bumps echoing in the room.

Jack watched as Kate's brow furrowed and her eyes opened and she glanced around, disoriented for just a moment.

"Hey," she said casually, and he returned the greeting as she stood and yawned and stretched. "Comfortable couch," she added, by way of explanation, and then grew more serious. "How's Claire?"

"Left her with Locke and Sayid. I tried to talk her into coming here, resting in the bedroom, but she doesn't want to move. Doesn't think it would be good for Aaron, either, with the alarm."

"Where is Aaron?" Kate questioned curiously, realizing she hadn't heard or seen him all night.

"Sun," Jack said simply, and Kate nodded.

Jack stuck a Dharma dinner in the oven, and when he stood up and caught Kate's gaze, he stared at her for a moment.

"What?" he asked, genuinely confused.

Kate looked nervous, hopeful, a little scared and, more than anything, determined.

"Don't say no until you hear me out, okay? I have an idea."

Jack sighed and rubbed his face tiredly.

"Kate, it's really, really late in the day for 'I have an idea'," he said good-naturedly, shooting her a gentle smile. "Can it wait?"

"We don't have to act on it tonight, but I think we should talk it through."

Sighing heavily again, Jack sat down on the couch.

"Okay. I'm listening. But if this is about Rousseau and her traps, I'm way ahead of you. She's caught four of us now – five, actually, since we were both in that net – and one of the others. The traps need to go. I'm going to talk to her as soon as --"

"Great, Jack, but that's not where I was going with this."

He looked up at her expectantly.

Kate took a moment to collect her thoughts, then slowly began her practiced approach.

"We need drugs."

Jack gave her a 'no kidding' look.

"Yeah, we do," he agreed.

"Desmond had drugs."

Jack nodded again.

"Desmond had enough drugs for an army," Jack said amiably, in total agreement. "And I've still got them. But they're unrecognizable, Kate. We've talked about this. I have no idea what they are or what they'll do."

Kate nodded, biting her lip anxiously, but with an almost excited gleam in her eyes. She knew he was about to catch on to her point.

"Don't you think it's time we found out?" she asked quietly but pointedly, her eyes locked on his.

A look of understanding lit in his eyes, and he stared up at her, a little surprised even as it occurred to him that he should have expected this from her.

"I'm not going to like this, am I?" He asked.

"I hereby volunteer to be your test subject, Jack."

She was smiling, and he looked at her incredulously.

"No." He was firm.

"Why?"

"You want the long list or the short one?" he asked emphatically, standing up and starting to pace. "It's insane."

Kate fixed a stubborn gaze on him.

"We were both there tonight, watching Claire suffer."

"And I feel bad about that," he said, nodding, "But that's no reason to… to…"

"Experiment?" she filled in.

"This isn't a joke, Kate!"

"I've thought it through. I have no allergies. I'm young, healthy. I'm the perfect candidate." She stood firm, speaking matter-of-factly, tossing the ball back into his court.

"I am not going to pump you full of foreign drugs just to see what happens."

"We need the drugs."

"We've got the heroin…"

"You said yourself that it's a last resort for the already dying."

Jack shook his head and sat down again, his dinner forgotten.

This was crazy.

"What if they're not all even drugs? What if he's got poison in there somewhere?"

"Come on, Jack!"

"Is it that out of the question in this place?"

"You think he'd store poison among his own meds?"

He hesitated.

Before he could respond, she pushed on.

"We can do this. You examine me, see what you can figure out, drug by drug. We get Hurley to take notes. Keep Sayid around to help out in case we need him --"

"In case of emergency, you mean," Jack filled in, and Kate quieted for just long enough for him to spot a hint of real fear in her eyes. "Why do you have to do this?" he asked her gently. "Why are you so gung ho about risking yourself? It's like with the dynamite, Kate…" he paused, then added thoughtfully, "You act like you owe the world."

A sadness came over her at that, and she stood awkwardly for a moment before sitting down next to him, apparently suddenly fascinated by her hands.

After a few moments of silence, he realized she wasn't going to answer him.

"Kate…"

"If I don't do this, Jack, every time someone gets hurt – and you know they will, over and over again – I'm going to feel responsible, listening to them suffer. _We can do this!_ And if we don't…"

She let him fill in the rest for himself, and stood up to check on his dinner, letting him think.

When she'd pulled what looked like a poor excuse for pasta out of the oven and set in on top of the stove to cool, she stood silently, waiting.

She knew Jack well enough to know that he needed to think things through for himself and convince himself that he was in control.

Sure enough, a few minutes later he started speaking with resolve, his eyes locked on hers.

"We start small."

She nodded, a little bit more afraid now that he'd finally agreed to it.

"Pills first. We'll talk about injections later," he added, and she nodded again.

He let a few moments pass in silence, then stood up and took a few steps toward her.

"When do you want to do this, Kate?"

Kate swallowed. Hard.

"Tomorrow."

…


	2. Chapter 2

_Author's note: You guys absolutely amazed me with the number of reviews to chapter one! This was just a little thing that occurred to me one day, and that first chapter was so short, and so I really appreciate all the interest. I wouldn't have even thought to continue this so soon if it hadn't been for all the review emails filling my inbox. I hope this chapter lives up to what you were expecting._

_Laura – I've addressed the 'why couldn't they just use a boar?' issue in this chapter. Thanks for pointing out the idea!_

_Again, as a disclaimer, I don't own these characters and mean no infringement. _

_And again, your feedback means the world to me. _

**Test Subject**

Chapter Two

Sawyer was sprawled out on the jungle floor surrounded by fallen fruit when Jack found him.

Jack wondered if he'd ever felt as relaxed as Sawyer looked, leisurely enjoying his breakfast.

He guessed not. Certainly not today.

"Something I can do for ya, Doc?" Sawyer drawled.

Jack shoved his hands into his pockets and looked away.

They'd been on good terms lately, but that didn't mean Jack enjoyed having to come to Sawyer for anything.

"Yeah, there is," Jack answered seriously. "You said you gave me all the meds?"

Sawyer looked him over, then nodded.

"Every last little pill. If I'd ever been the Boy Scout type I'd tell you 'Scout's honor'." He paused, tipped his head thoughtfully. "You and me both know that me and honor aren't thick as thieves anyway."

Jack had no interest in small talk.

"I'm not just talking about pills."

"Then maybe you ought to specify what exactly it is that you are looking for."

"Epipens."

Sawyer's eyes narrowed as the word registered.

"The allergy things?"

"Automatic injectors for epinephrine."

"Comes in a little plastic tube?" Sawyer smiled again as Jack sighed. He didn't really mind Jack anymore, but having something to hold over his head was always a joy.

"You have one or not?" Jack asked, tiring of this.

"I might."

"Plane that size, I'd say you should have a lot of them."

"Sorry, never did get around to finding every last bit of loot in the wreckage."

Jack squinted up at the sun for a moment, thinking.

He didn't want Sawyer involved in this, but if ever there was one sure-fire way to get Sawyer to hand something over…

"It's for Kate," Jack admitted, and almost immediately Sawyer was on his feet.

"Kate?"

"Yes."

"Freckles?" Sawyer asked, shocked, as though Jack couldn't possibly mean _the_ Kate, the one they both cared more about than either was willing to admit.

Jack only nodded, and Sawyer shot him an accusing glance.

"She needs 'em? Then what the hell are you standing around chatting for?"

Sawyer took off toward the beach, and Jack was right behind him.

Sawyer ducked into his tent and found what he was looking for so quickly that Jack didn't even have time to follow him in before Sawyer was out on the beach again, holding out three adult size Epipen injectors.

"She okay? Where is she?" Sawyer asked, clearly rattled by all of this, as he handed the supplies over.

"She's fine," Jack admitted, a little bit ashamed to have tricked him.

But he hadn't lied. Not really. This _was_ for Kate.

"What the hell do you mean she's fine? Either she needs the injector thing or she don't, Doc! Which is it?"

"It's a preventative measure, Sawyer."

Sawyer stared at him for a long moment, but it was clear a weight was dropping from his shoulders.

He took a deep breath after a moment, apparently more relieved than angry.

"So what's she allergic to?"

"Hopefully nothing," Jack replied absentmindedly, his focus on checking the expiration dates of the Epipens.

The distinctive sound of a Sawyer scoff of mock astonishment made Jack look up, and _now_ Sawyer looked distinctly pissed.

"Then they're not really for _Kate_ then, are they?" he asked in a low tone.

"Oh, they're for Kate," Jack assured him.

"Got some explainin' to do, then, Dr. Jack."

"It's a long story."

They looked at each other for a moment, and it quickly became clear that Sawyer wasn't going anywhere without information.

"You'd hear soon enough," Jack finally said, as much to himself as to Sawyer, deciding to come out with it. "Kate volunteered to try some of the meds Desmond had in the hatch, so we'll be able to use them when we need them."

"And you're just fine and dandy with that?" Sawyer asked, shooting Jack an incredulous look.

"No. But we need the meds, and we're going to be careful, and…" He paused, then shrugged a little bit. "It's Kate," he added simply, as if that said it all. "Have _you_ ever tried saying 'no' to her?"

Sawyer sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes.

The man had a point.

…

Down the beach from where Jack and Sawyer stood contemplating the situation, Kate slowly approached the small infirmary tent Jack had set up for Claire yesterday.

Kate needed to see her, to remind herself that she had a good reason for what she was about to do.

Last night it had all made sense to her, but in the harsh light of day it seemed more risky, and it felt like she had more to lose.

It scared her more than she would ever admit to anyone, especially Jack, and she needed a reality check like only the island's currently injured could give her.

"Hey," she said quietly, greeting Claire with a gentle smile as she sat down next to her in the sand. "How's the leg?"

"Hurts, but I'll live, or so Jack tells me." Claire's tone was light, but the pain and strain of the last twenty-four hours was written all over her face.

"Kate?" Sun's distinctive voice came from right behind Kate, and Kate turned to face her and found that she had Aaron in her arms.

"Hey," Kate said, her eyes on the baby. "How's he doing?"

"He is okay," Sun told her, "But I need to go to the washroom. Could you take him for just a little while?"

Kate looked around briefly, wondering just what time it was and whether Jack was waiting for her, but nodded.

Sun gently placed the baby in her arms and left, and Claire reached over to brush her hand over his head.

"Hi, Sweetheart. Mummy missed you last night."

"Sun's had him all night?" Kate asked curiously, and Claire nodded.

"She's been great. I'm kind of stuck at the moment."

"Good practice for her, I guess."

"Yeah, it is." Claire looked from the baby to Kate and back again. "You seem tense, if you don't mind my saying so."

"Just never been good with kids," Kate told her, not wanting to worry her with the knowledge of what she was doing today, but even as she said it she found herself smiling at Aaron as he grinned widely up at her.

"Could have fooled me," Claire said. "Hey, did I ever thank you?"

"For what?" Kate asked, genuinely confused.

"For him. For Aaron. For helping me the night he was born."

Kate shrugged.

"Not in so many words. I think we all got focused on Boone and the funeral…"

"Yeah, I guess we did," Claire agreed. "I guess we kind of lucked out, in a way, being away from here when all of that was going on. When he was dying. I guess it was pretty awful."

"I was here for a while, before I found you," Kate shared thoughtfully, thinking that the memory of it was probably exactly the reminder she needed today. "It was pretty bad. He was in agony, and Jack was getting desperate."

Claire sighed, taking the baby's tiny hand in hers.

"At least something good came of that night. And for the record, I'm thanking you now."

Kate nodded in acknowledgement, then looked down at the baby again.

She looked up a moment later to see Claire shifting position slowly and painfully, and though it wasn't an easy thing to watch, it was exactly why Kate was here.

"Jack and I have a plan," Kate told her, wanting to reassure her friend but reluctant to give her details. "We're working on finding pain meds. You should know that."

"Hurry up, will you?" Claire teased good-naturedly, but she didn't bother to press Kate for details, and that was just fine by Kate.

They sat in a comfortable silence until Sun returned for the baby a minute later, and when Kate had handed Aaron over she stood up and brushed off her jeans.

She took a deep breath and set her sights on the path that led to the hatch.

"I'll see you later," she told them both distractedly.

She just hoped that was it true.

…

"Why can't you just use a damn boar or somethin'?"

Sawyer had insisted on following Jack to the hatch, and his questions were starting to wear on Jack's nerves.

"'Cause a boar can't talk, Sawyer."

"And Kate can," Hurley added unnecessarily. Both he and Sayid were nearby, having been recruited to help.

Now they were only waiting for Kate herself.

"You need her to talk all through this?" Sawyer asked, and Jack nodded.

"I need to know how she feels."

They were all quiet for a moment, but then Sawyer started up again.

"It's insane to risk one of our two decent trackers," he muttered, not willing to admit that it bothered him on a much more personal level than that.

"We're not taking any more risks than we have to," Jack said, again convincing himself as much as Sawyer. "We're going to take it slow. I'm going to give her small doses. We've got the Epipens in case of an allergic reaction. I'm going to keep a close eye on her…" Jack ran out of things to say, and they were again plunged into silence, waiting.

But silence had never sat well with Sawyer.

"Some secretary," he muttered, glancing at Hurley. "Guy can't even spell 'bodies'."

"Dude, not cool," Hurley said quietly, as though genuinely hurt and surprised by the comment. "I'm doing my part, Man."

"Speaking of which, what exactly is _your_ part?" Sayid asked Sawyer pointedly. "Must you be here?"

Before Sawyer could come up with a retort, Kate walked purposefully into the room. A look of surprise came over her face as she noticed Sawyer.

"What are you doing here?" Kate asked, her tone neutral.

"I was just asking him the same thing," Sayid said, but Sawyer didn't budge from his place against the far wall.

Undeterred, Kate fixed her gaze on Jack.

"What did we decide to start with?" She asked. Her tone was carefully strong and confident, but they all heard a slight tremor running through it.

"Not so fast," Jack told her, naturally falling back into the familiar doctor role. "Take a seat." He gestured to the couch. "Before we do anything I have to get down some of your medical history."

Kate looked less than thrilled at that, but after a moment she slowly made her way over to the couch.

"I doubt my presence is necessary for this portion of the experiment," Sayid said, excusing himself and heading for the air lock door, appreciating the need for privacy.

Hurley watched him go and turned to Jack, holding out the notebook and pen that had mysteriously appeared in the hatch not long after Locke and Eko had gone searching for the man who wasn't Henry Gale.

"Dude, I can take notes or you can, totally up to you. Or, uh, her. Or you?" Hurley wasn't sure.

"I've got this," Jack told him. "I'll come get you guys later."

Hurley nodded and was soon gone, and both Jack and Kate turned to look at Sawyer expectantly.

Despite the unease evident in Kate's expression and body language, Sawyer couldn't excuse himself.

"Payback's a bitch, Freckles," he told Kate gleefully, taking a seat on the arm rest furthest from her seat on the couch and crossing his legs, just to give the effect of settling in. "You sat by and laughed when I was getting tested for my spectacles, didn't ya now?"

Jack shot him a slightly disgusted look, but Kate only looked miserable, and didn't seem focused on him.

It hadn't occurred to her that she would have to open herself up to anything like this.

Answering questions about her past hadn't been part of the plan.

Sawyer being there didn't really matter much, she decided. She had no intention of telling Jack anything that Sawyer or anyone else couldn't hear.

Some things were just buried too deep.

"What do you need to know?" She asked, her wary eyes meeting Jack's serious ones.

"For starters, have you ever been seriously ill?"

"No."

"Ever had surgery?"

"No."

"Ever been prone to dizziness or fainting spells?"

Kate hesitated here, opening her mouth to say something and then stopping, and then starting again.

"Not for no reason," she finally said, and unconsciously started nervously running her fingers over the fabric of the arm of the couch.

"What does that mean?" Jack asked, the doctor in him curious while the friend in him felt vaguely concerned.

"I only ever got dizzy or faint when I was sick, hurt… whatever."

Kate half-shrugged and met his eyes, silently asking him to drop it.

Jack nodded and quickly looked down at the notepad in front of him, only to disguise the fact that this troubled him.

It really didn't have anything to do with what they were doing today, but it was an odd statement. Had she often been sick, or hurt, or 'whatever'?

"Okay," he said, and drew in a deep breath, moving on. "Have you ever had trouble with your blood pressure, or anemia, anything along those lines?"

Kate shook her head in the negative, and he glanced down at the pad of paper again.

"You're sure about having no known allergies?"

This time she nodded.

"Ever take recreational drugs?"

Kate looked up with a tiny, amused smile, and Sawyer smirked.

"Knew it," he mumbled victoriously.

"Just pot, just a couple of times, when I was… maybe eighteen, nineteen," she clarified.

"Just this, just that. You sure 'bout that, Freckles?"

"Anything out of the ordinary come of that? Any reaction everyone else wasn't having?" Jack asked Kate, completely ignoring Sawyer, and she shook her head again.

"Okay, the most important thing is your history with prescription drugs," Jack said, meeting her eyes again. "Anything specific you can remember?"

"Well… for an ear infection, when I was a kid."

"Standard penicillin?"

She shrugged, unsure.

"And no side effects or problems that you remember?"

"None." Another little shake of her head accompanied the answer, and then she hesitated almost unnoticeably before continuing. "When I was sixteen I broke my arm."

"How?"

A flicker of painful memory darkened her features for the shortest of seconds, but she shook it off and forced what passed for an embarrassed smile.

"Fell out of a tree."

Jack nodded again, his eyes hitting the paper again.

There was more to it than she was saying. He could see that, and he wondered if Sawyer could, too.

But it didn't really matter. At least not from a medical standpoint.

He had to stay professional here.

"They must have prescribed painkillers," he prompted, and Kate nodded.

"I can't remember the name, but the doctor definitely called it 'Percocet's baby brother'. I always remembered that."

"Oxycocet?"

"Could be." She rolled the word around in her head for a moment, thinking back. "It's been a long time."

"Don't worry. The ever-important question remains --"

"No, I didn't have any side effects," Kate filled in for him, knowing the question before he asked it. "No weird reaction of any kind."

Satisfied with that, Jack took a moment to look over all that he had already written down, and then turned to Kate with one final question, his expression half serious and half teasing even though it was a standard question.

"One last thing, Kate. Is there any chance at all that you could be pregnant?"

Sawyer's head snapped up and he fixed his gaze on Kate along with Jack's.

She shook her head, her unambiguous expression firmly indicating that there was no chance.

Both men liked that answer.

"Okay. Then I guess we're ready to get started." Jack turned to Sawyer. "That just about ends the 'turnabout is fair play' portion of all of this, don't you think?"

"You tryin' to kick me out, Doc?"

"Can you send in Sayid and Hurley on your way out?"

Sawyer opened his mouth to start what would inevitably be a long and pointless argument, but before he got started his eyes fell on Kate's face.

She was scared, so nervous sitting there quietly on the couch that her hands were nearly shaking. She was trying but failing to hide it, and the very fact that she didn't seem to be paying any attention to the brewing chaos got to him.

She was in no place to deal with breaking up yet another fight.

And damn if he was going to be the one to make this harder.

Of course, that didn't mean he had to admit he cared.

"Guess I can tell when I'm not wanted," he tossed out indignantly, and then he headed for the door.

Left alone for the moment, Jack sat down next to Kate.

"You okay?"

"Mmmhmmm." She didn't sound the least bit convincing, but the forced smile appeared on her face again.

"You don't look it."

Before she could come up with an answer, Sayid and Hurley were back.

"Time to get this show on the road?" Hurley asked, reaching for the paper and pen Jack had abandoned.

"I'm ready when Kate is," Jack told him, and Kate nodded and pushed herself up off the couch.

Jack led the way to the bedroom, and Kate stood in the doorway for a moment, flanked by Hurley and Sayid, looking at the bottom bunk.

"You want me to lie down?"

"Probably a good idea," Jack told her, and she slowly lowered herself onto the bed.

"You should know that I've never really liked being anyone's patient," Kate warned him, and he offered her a warm smile.

"So far you're doing all right." He turned to the array of pill bottles and assorted bottled liquids on the table next to the bed, and she turned her eyes toward Sayid.

"Feels weird. It's been a long time since I've been in a real bed."

"In all the time you've spent down in this place, you've never slept here?"

Kate shook her head.

"Slept out there, on the couch, sometimes. This room always seemed reserved for the sick or dying."

Before any of them could stop to think about the meaning of that statement too thoroughly, Jack selected a single pill bottle and sat down on the edge of the bed.

His physical proximity was a comfort, and Kate forced herself to take a few deep breaths and relax, staring up at the bottom of the other bunk above her.

"Hurley?" Jack called without looking over at him, focused on the bottle of pills in his hand.

"Yeah?"

"Take this down: two-zero-nine-eight-five-eight. That's how the bottle is labeled."

Hurley nodded and made a note.

Jack reached out and gently took Kate's wrist in his hand. Her eyes followed the movement, and then met with his.

"Just taking your pulse," he assured her, even though he was sure she had figured that out.

The slight physical contact was nice, despite the circumstances.

"Hurley, take this down. Heart rate seventy-two beats per minute."

"Is that normal?" Kate asked, curious and concerned, and Jack nodded.

"Just fine."

"Jack, is there anything in particular you'd like me to do?" Sayid asked, happy to help but unsure of exactly what he was doing here.

Jack reached for the three Epipens on the table and held them out to Sayid.

"Hold these." Jack's expression was gravely serious. "Everything should be fine, but stay here, stay ready. I might need you. You're backup."

Sayid nodded, satisfied with that, and took up a position standing against the wall, out of the way but available.

"I'm only going to give you half of one of these," Jack told Kate, and she said nothing, her eyes locked on the pill bottle in his hands.

"Kate?" Jack waited for her to turn her gaze from the pills to him.

"Yeah?" she asked, confused.

"You okay?"

"Yeah." She nodded haltingly, and he took one pill out of the bottle and used a butter knife to cut it in half on the table by the bed.

"Hurley?"

"Dude?"

"Make a note that we're giving her half of one of these."

"Got it."

Jack had previously set out a glass of water, and suddenly there was nothing left to wait for, no way to stall and prolong this.

"Sit up a bit," Jack told Kate quietly, and she did as asked, supporting her body on her elbows.

He handed her the glass and the half of a pill, and she looked at it for just a moment before popping it into her mouth and taking a gulp of water.

She lay back down, and they were all tense and silent.

Ten seconds passed, then twenty.

"You feel okay?" Jack asked.

"Fine." Her voice sounded a little bit unnatural, but they all wrote it off as a stress reaction.

Jack reached for her wrist again, taking her pulse.

"No change," he said when he was done, looking over his shoulder at Hurley, and Hurley made a note. "Been about a minute," Jack added, and Hurley amended the rough notation.

They repeated this process a few times, his fingers rarely leaving her wrist for more than a moment, and then only to shine a flashlight in her eyes and take a close look at them.

The fourth time he took her pulse, he noticed a change and held his breath for a few seconds as he made sure he was right.

"Hurley, five minutes in, heart rate slowing down slightly. Approximately sixty-six beats per minute."

"Dude, that a bad thing?" Hurley asked, but before Jack could answer, Kate reached out and grasped Jack's arm.

He couldn't help noticing immediately that her grip was weak.

"Jack, I… it's…" Her speech was uneven, slightly slurred, and he took her face in his hands, looking her over intently.

"Kate? What? What's happening? Does anything hurt? How do you feel? Talk to me."

"I just… I feel kind of…"

"Kind of what?"

Her eyes rolled back until all he could see of them was white.

And just like that, she was unconscious.

…


	3. Chapter 3

_Author's note: You guys are fantastic! Such wonderful reviews! I absolutely love them! How could I not continue this story with that kind of support? _

_Some of this chapter might seem like filler, but believe it or not it all builds toward some things that will happen in a few chapters. _

_Usual little disclaimer – these characters are not mine. Just borrowing 'em. _

_Feedback rocks my world!_

**Test Subject**

Chapter Three

Staring into Kate's unconscious face, Jack forced himself to stay calm.

This didn't have to mean anything bad, he reasoned to himself.

She might be okay.

She might be just fine.

She _had to be_ just fine.

"Dude, what's happening?" Hurley asked for what felt like the hundredth time, and his panicked voice irked Jack.

"She's… her pulse is okay," Jack told him, sounding less than composed. "It's holding steady in the high sixties." He put two gentle fingers against her neck just to double check. Only inhibition had made him use her wrist before, and there was no room nor any need for that now.

After a moment he leaned over her, placing his cheek close to her mouth, feeling her breath against his cheek.

"She's breathing fine… she's breathing just fine. She just… she just lost consciousness."

"Is that bad?" Hurley asked, openly worried.

"Not necessarily," Jack told him.

"Dude, you keep saying stuff like that! What, like, you don't know?"

"I can't be sure," Jack said, getting a bit annoyed. He turned to look at Hurley and spotted Sayid nearby. He'd almost forgotten he was there.

Jack went through another quick little mini-exam, checking Kate's pulse, her breathing, and then lifting her eyelids to look into her eyes.

"I think… I don't want to speak too soon, but I think maybe we've found a sedative. A very potent, fast-acting sedative," he told them.

"How will we know for sure?" Sayid asked, finally speaking up.

Jack reached out to touch Kate's face – first brushing his fingers along her right cheek, then her left, then pressing them against her forehead.

He told himself he was checking for signs of fever, though it didn't make much sense.

The truth was that he needed an excuse to touch her, to reassure himself that her body was warm and alive and that she would likely be just fine.

He answered Sayid's question a bit solemnly, and without turning to look at him.

"We wait for her to wake up."

…

It was a long wait.

Several hours later, Jack was still sitting by Kate's bedside.

Sayid and Hurley had long ago ventured out into the rest of the hatch. Judging from what he could hear and what he saw on a couple of brief bathroom breaks, it seemed Sayid was passing the time examining the primitive electronics surrounding the computer while Hurley tried everything from reading to ping pong.

Sawyer had returned at one point, but upon finding Jack sitting so close to Kate and watching her so intently, he had only taken the time to ask if she would be all right before dejectedly returning to the beach.

Jack didn't care. His entire being was focused on Kate.

It wasn't that he was _that_ worried, really, though he couldn't say he wasn't concerned. Every bit of medical evidence he had told him that she was fine.

It was a little bit mesmerizing, though, to be able to watch her like this. She looked peaceful rather than worried or pensive or saddened or guilt-ridden or afraid.

She looked like he figured she might have looked before her life was shot to hell.

He didn't know when it had happened, exactly, but he was sure it was long before the plane crash.

He was mulling all of this over and absentmindedly rubbing gentle circles on the back of her hand with his thumb when she first stirred, and he immediately leaned forward, his senses alert.

"Kate?"

Her eyes opened slowly and looked around in confusion.

"Hey. Hey, it's Jack," he said quietly. He smiled genuinely, happy to see her awake, and through a sleepy haze a little smile graced her lips as well.

"Hi," she murmured sleepily, and his smile grew as it crossed his mind that sometimes, inexplicably, 'adorable' really was the only word to accurately describe her.

"How do you feel?" he asked after a moment, and she seemed to give it some thought before answering.

"Kind of out of it," she said quietly, her words still just the slightest bit slurred. "Groggy."

"Makes sense," he said. "You've been out for hours."

"I just passed out?" she asked, as if she couldn't quite believe she would do that, and he nodded.

"Right in front of us. Scared the hell out of Hurley," he teased, smiling again. "Worried me, too, for a minute, but your pulse stayed strong and steady and you were breathing just fine. I think what I gave you was a sedative."

"Some sedative," she mumbled, amazed at how drowsy she still felt.

"Nothing hurts, though, right?" Jack asked, concern entering his tone again, and she shook her head.

"No."

"How many fingers?" he asked, holding three fingers in front of her face, and she laughed a short laugh, apparently amused. "What!" he asked, confused.

"Doctor's actually ask that?" She gave him a look, and he nodded.

"Can you just answer the question?" he asked, though he couldn't hide a little grin.

"Three."

He nodded, and then took a flashlight in one hand and a pen in the other, and shined the light in her eyes while waving the pen slowly back and forth in front of her face.

"What are you doing now?" she asked, and though she didn't laugh there was laughter in her eyes, and he put the pen down and sighed.

"Okay, you're fine," he conceded. "At least you're fine enough to be a pain in the ass."

He was kidding, and they both knew it, and so when they both fell silent it was comfortable rather than tense.

"This actually feels good," she said quietly after a moment. "I can't remember the last time I got this much rest. And in a real bed! And it's good, isn't it? I mean, we might be able to put someone out if we need to."

Jack nodded, pleased with the results.

"It's very good. I just wish we'd figured this out a long time ago."

"So I was right?" she prompted, a playful gleam in her eyes. "This was a good idea."

"I wouldn't go right to 'good idea'," he told her. "But… yes, you did good."

Kate looked triumphant, then a little bit concerned. She fought to mask the concern, but didn't quite succeed.

"So are we moving forward with this? Trying the others?" she asked, and Jack sighed and looked thoughtful.

"I don't know. We'll talk that through later."

Kate nodded, then struggled to sit up and found that moving made her dizzy. Jack reached around and put his arm around her to support her, and she pressed both of her hands against his upper chest reflexively, to keep herself from pitching forward.

Gaining a little bit more balance, she looked up and met his eyes, and pulled her hands away.

"Sorry."

"You hungry?" he asked, avoiding the awkwardness altogether.

"Yeah, actually. I could eat. Do you have anything made out there?"

"I stayed here with you," he said, and he didn't miss the touched look that flitted across her face. "But I can go get something together, bring it in here. Hurley and Sayid are still around, I could have them come stay --"

"No, I want to come out there," Kate insisted. "I need to get up. I actually have to go to the washroom," she admitted, and he stood up so that she could swing her legs around.

Before she tried to stand, he put a hand on her shoulder and looked her in the eye.

"Kate, you should know that until the effects of the sedative wear off completely, you might feel a little unsteady," he warned.

Kate nodded, and willingly took his hands and let him help her up off the bed.

She was steady enough standing there, but as she tried to take a step spots danced in front of her eyes and her legs refused to support her.

She would have fallen if he hadn't quickly snaked his arm tightly around her waist to support her.

She had always been the type of person who hated to rely on anyone else, and yet… _damn_ that felt good.

She hadn't thought of this as something that would bring her closer to Jack, but it seemed to be having that effect, at least temporarily and in a physical sense, and it was a nice bonus.

For all the differences they'd had, working on something together still felt so _right_.

Especially when it was like this.

"You gonna be okay?" he asked, and she turned to find him looking her over carefully.

"What was that about the effects of the sedative wearing off?" she joked.

He chuckled and started helping her toward the door.

She grew steadier on her feet as they made their way toward the bathroom, but even so he felt uneasy about letting her out of his sight.

When they were at the bathroom door, she looked up at him.

"Jack?"

"Yeah?"

"You're, uh, going to have to let me go now."

He looked reluctant, glancing at all the hard surfaces she could easily bump her head on if she got dizzy, but understood the need for privacy.

"You get light-headed, at all, you yell. Immediately," he told her sternly, and though she nodded, he didn't really believe her. "And if you're not out in a few minutes, I'm coming in."

She nodded and disappeared into the washroom.

He need not have worried, though, because after a couple of minutes he heard the toilet flush and the sink run, and a minute after that she emerged looking stable and balanced, if still a bit sleepy.

He wrapped his arm around her as before, and though they both realized she didn't necessarily need the physical support anymore, neither of them said it out loud.

They made their way out into the central living area, and Hurley immediately tossed down the record he was holding and broke into a huge grin when he saw her.

"Hey, it's Sleeping Beauty! Dude, come here!" Hurley called to Sayid, and Sayid came in from the computer room just as Jack helped Kate into the booth in front of the table.

"It's good to see you awake," Sayid told her.

"Good to be awake," Kate returned.

"So you're alive and kicking. That rocks!" Hurley looked around at all of them, then over at Jack curiously. "Does this mean I can, like, go? 'Cause I'm happy to help and all, but I'm kind of sick of this place."

"I've been going a bit stir-crazy myself," Sayid added, and Jack nodded, more than happy to be left alone with Kate now.

"You guys can go ahead," Jack told them. "Thanks for this, though."

"Yeah, thank you," Kate added, resting her chin in her hand, her arm propped up on her elbow on the table's surface.

With parting looks, the two men left, and Jack walked over to the pantry, his mind on making dinner.

"What do you feel like?" he called to Kate.

A moment later her slightly confused voice called back: "I'm fine!"

Jack cracked another smile.

"No, I mean what do you feel like eating?"

"Do we have pasta?" she called to him, and he grabbed a box of Dharma issued penne and a jar of Dharma issued tomato sauce.

"As you wish!"

…

When the pasta was ready and Jack had set two full plates out on the table, he slid into the booth across from Kate.

They both ate hungrily for a minute, and when she stopped and looked over at him, he noticed quickly.

"Do I have sauce on my face?" he asked casually.

"Jack… I didn't say anything, did I?" She looked truly troubled by the thought, and he took a long sip of Dharma fruit juice before responding.

Leave it to Kate to worry about privacy issues, even now.

"You were out cold, Kate. Really. You couldn't have said anything if you tried."

She looked satisfied with that, and he watched her curiously as she ate a few more forkfuls.

"You're not much of a drinker, are you?" he questioned after a moment.

Kate looked surprised by the question, but shrugged.

"Not really. I mean, I'll drink, but… not much, usually. Not if I'm thinking straight, anyway. Never really liked to feel out of control."

"That's what I figured."

He looked pleased with himself for figuring that much out about her, and she shrugged.

They each took a few more bites, and then she turned the tables on him.

"You drink some, don't you?" She said knowingly, and somehow 'some' sounded more like 'a lot'.

Jack nodded after a moment.

"I've been known to. Sometimes maybe a little bit more than I should. Figure I got it from my dad."

"I didn't," she said simply, before she could stop to think about it, and then looked a bit surprised that she'd said it at all.

Her eyes stayed on her plate for several seconds, and he decided to let it go.

Searching for an appropriate way to lighten the mood now that they'd suddenly hit what seemed to be a serious subject for them both, he settled on an anecdote appropriate to the situation.

"You know, I had a patient once, who was on these painkillers, the big guns… made her kind of talkative, but she didn't know what she was saying. I swear the first thing out of her mouth when I went in on rounds one day was 'Dr. Shephard, do helicopters eat their young?' "

He laughed, and Kate cracked a smile.

"If we come across those painkillers, shoot me," she told him, a little bit too seriously for his taste.

He turned his attention back to his dinner, and she leaned back with a far away look.

"I think I was thirteen when I first got drunk." She shared this willingly, like she'd shared other bits and pieces of her life along the way, because none of her secrets were involved. "I had this friend, my best friend, and he was the kind of guy who never would have been drunk at thirteen, and he pretty much dragged me out of the party, and I swear I threw up all over a real, honest-to-god white picket fence." She waited for him to meet her eyes. "Guess I should have taken that as a sign, huh?"

She looked light-hearted about it all, so he only smiled and picked at his food again.

They ate the rest of the meal in silence, and the rest of the evening passed by quietly and lazily as well.

They talked a little bit, read a little bit, put on some music now and then.

She seemed to recover her energy before long and grew bored and wanted to leave, but he insisted that they spend the night in the hatch, so he could keep an eye on her, just in case.

She resigned herself to that fact and lay down on the couch with a book she had almost no interest in, humoring him. She was surprised to find she was still rather tired, and she let her eyes drift shut.

When she opened them again, Jack was leaning over her, looking into her eyes, and while he was probably doing it for medical purposes, she found herself looking back at him, drawn to him, wanting to kiss him in this calm, still moment, so differently and deliberately than that day out in the woods.

She leaned forward, inching her face toward his, and he didn't pull back or look away.

Encouraged, she began to close the space between them.

And then the damn timer went off and jarred them both, and the moment was broken.

Jack sighed, and looked annoyed as he slowly headed for the computer room.

When he returned, Kate was sitting up on the couch, and he sat down next to her.

"So… Jack?"

"Yeah?" He waited expectantly.

"Are we moving forward with this?"

He was thrown for a moment until he realized what she meant, and released a breath he didn't realize he was holding.

"I guess I have to leave that up to you," he told her. "I'm okay with it if you are. This went well, and we can use those pills, but we need more than sedatives."

"So tomorrow we move on," she said, looking less than thrilled but determined.

Jack nodded.

So far so good, anyway.

…


	4. Chapter 4

_Author's note: Thanks as always for all the wonderful replies! You guys always manage to make my week! _

_As always, these characters do not belong to me (but oh, don't I wish that they did!) and feedback would be so very, very much appreciated. _

_I'll say more later, so as not to say too much before you've read the chapter. (ie please see the author's note at the end of the chapter) _

**Test Subject**

Chapter Four

Neither Jack nor Kate would have voluntarily said it out loud, but they both liked falling asleep listening to each other breathe.

It wasn't nearly as intimate as it sounded, of course.

He slept in the top bunk, and she in the bottom.

Still, though, they had been logging a lot of time together lately, and essentially sharing a bedroom, even if only for the sake of their project.

They'd tried three different meds from Desmond's stash so far. The first had knocked Kate out cold for the better part of a day, while the second and third had had no noticeable effect at all. Jack had examined both pills, and suspected they were either antibiotics or something akin to aspirin, and since there had been no negative effect from either one he planned to give them to the next person who came to him complaining of headache, provided of course that he or she was willing, as a form of further test.

The whole process had become significantly more relaxed than it was the first time around. They still always had at least one or two people nearby in case anything happened and Jack needed an extra hand, and they still kept the Epipens within reach in case of allergic reaction, but Jack was taking his own brief notes and no one stood by rigidly in the corner as Sayid had done that first day.

They'd become strangely comfortable with what they were doing, the further they went without any problems. Over the last two uneventful days they had played too many games of darts to count. They were surprisingly well matched, and neither was quite sure anymore who held the greater number of games won.

They had shared every meal, developed a few inside jokes, and talked through their plans for the drug project.

It was nice, the two of them working together on something, just like it used to be.

Today, though, the nerves had been kicked up a notch again. They had already tried every kind of pill Desmond had, and so they were moving on from pills to injections.

Charlie and Hurley were out in the living area, listening to music, available if needed.

Kate sat waiting patiently on the bed while Jack looked over his supplies again, a look of deep concentration on his face.

"You look worried," Kate told him after a few seconds had passed in silence, and he looked up at her.

"Just want to be sure I don't give you too much of this," Jack told her, and he picked up a bottle of liquid and a syringe, taking a deep breath.

"Everything's been fine so far," Kate reminded him. "This will be too."

Jack nodded, not wanting to worry his 'patient', but he couldn't deny to himself that this worried him more than the pills had. He suspected that it had the same effect on her, but if it did she was doing a good job of hiding it.

When he had filled the syringe and made a few notes in his notebook, he sat down in his chair next to her bed, syringe in hand.

"Might want to lie down," he suggested to Kate, who was sitting on the bed, her feet planted firmly on the floor.

Kate did as he asked, and he realized once she had that it left only one of her arms accessible to him.

"This arm okay, then?" he asked. She nodded, and he nodded back at her. "Okay."

It was tense again as they sat there, like it had been on the first day, and he positioned the needle in his hand and put it against her skin.

"You'll feel a little pinch," he told her, out of habit more than anything else, but she didn't react as he pushed the plunger.

He put the used needle aside and pulled his chair up closer to her.

"You okay?"

Her eyes narrowed, a look of surprise and unease coming over her, and she sat up quickly, looking down at her own arm.

"It's going numb," she stated simply, and then looked up at him, a question in her eyes.

A mixture of curiosity and concern filled his face, and he leaned forward and brushed his fingers over the skin of her forearm.

"Can you feel this?"

"A little… barely, it feels… it feels weird, Jack."

"Just numb?"

"I don't know how else to describe it."

Jack sat back for a second, thinking.

"You feel okay otherwise?"

"Yeah, I feel fine."

He took her unaffected arm and checked her pulse, and they were both silent while he counted her heart beats.

"Heart rate is just fine," he mumbled, more to himself than to her, and he reached out to touch her numbed arm again.

"You feel this now?" he asked again, and she shook her head, her eyes wider than usual, her mouth hanging open just slightly.

"I can't feel a thing now." Fear was creeping into her voice against her will, and he was quick to reassure her.

"It's just temporary. I'm sure it's just temporary. I think we probably just stumbled across a local anesthetic. That would be a fantastic thing to have, Kate. This is going to be great for the group." He smiled warmly, reassuringly. "Just relax."

Kate nodded yet again, apparently believing him, and a few deep breaths later she looked thoughtful rather than worried as she ran the fingers of her other hand over her numb arm.

"It's the weirdest thing," she said, and looked up at him. "I can't move my fingers at all."

Jack took that in with a nod and reached for his notepad to write it down, and then turned back and reached out for her arm.

"Tell me when you can feel this, okay?" he instructed her, and then slowly ran his finger up her arm.

When he reached the uppermost part of her arm, almost to her shoulder, the numbness died away. It took a split second for her to stop focusing on the sensation of his touch and answer him, and his finger traveled just an inch or so higher before she reacted.

"There," she said quickly, meeting his eyes again, and he nodded and made another note.

"So we know how far it extends." Jack sat back again, the look of quiet contemplation returning to him as he looked her over. After a moment, he seemed to make a decision. "You still feel okay otherwise?" he questioned again.

"Fine."

"No light-headedness?"

"No. Is that usually part of local anesthetic?"

"It can happen," he told her, his mind elsewhere already. "You okay for a few minutes with Hurley and Charlie?"

"Where are you going?"

"I just want to re-sterilize the needle," he told her, and though she thought it was a bizarre time for that, she didn't object.

"Charlie, Hurley?" Jack called loudly, and within a few seconds they were there, nearly crashing into each other in their hurry.

"Everything okay, Man?" Hurley asked quickly, his eyes on Kate.

"What's wrong?" Charlie added, and Jack held up his hands to quiet them.

"It's okay," he started, but Kate interrupted.

"I'm fine, nothing's wrong."

"What was in that bottle?" Hurley asked curiously, and Kate answered him before Jack could.

"We think it was a local anesthetic. Can't feel a thing," she said with a good-natured smile, nodding her head toward her arm.

"Seriously?" Hurley sounded almost excited, and promptly sat down next to her on the bed, intrigued. "So, like, if I punched you right now, you wouldn't even feel it?"

"Hurley!" Jack cautioned, but Hurley just grinned up at him.

"Kidding, Dude. She's cool here with us."

Kate looked up at Jack and nodded her agreement, and Jack turned toward Charlie, looking serious.

"If anything changes, she gets light-headed, whatever, you yell. I'll be right out in the kitchen."

"Got it. No worries, Mate," Charlie assured him.

Jack took one last look at Kate, and then quickly headed out to the kitchen. Charlie took his chair by the bed.

"So is it like going to the dentist? Like the freezing?" Charlie asked curiously, and Kate managed to shrug.

"Never had any cavities," she told him matter-of-factly.

He looked amazed.

"Never in your entire bloody childhood? My mum would have given me a medal!"

"I think I had six," Hurley chimed in with a grimace.

"I hear ya, Mate. I really overdid it with the candy bars and toffee the year I was nine. Had nearly my entire mouth frozen for three whole hours," Charlie said with a sigh.

Kate shifted over on the bed so as to lean against the wall behind it, and carefully used her good arm to place her other arm safely in her lap. She gazed out at the wall beyond the bed.

"I guess I've kind of felt like this before, but not at the dentist," she shared freely, comfortable in their presence. "I was hiding out in someone's backyard shed one year, up in Canada, in the middle of the winter. After a while I couldn't feel my fingers or toes at all. That hurt like hell while the numbness was setting in, though," she told them, and looked over at them again, smiling a sad little smile. "It was one of the worst birthdays I ever had."

"One of?" Charlie repeated, stunned. "What, do you Americans regularly spend birthdays being held captive or attacked with fire pokers?"

Kate smiled but said nothing, her eyes downcast.

When she looked up again Jack was standing in the doorway, and she didn't have to ask to know that he'd overheard.

The look on his face was the same slightly pained and disappointed look he always wore when reminded of her fugitive status, and it sparked a hint of something wounded in her eyes.

She hated that look.

She stayed quiet, silently daring him to stay anything.

Jack seemed to consider his next move for a moment, then opted to keep things light.

"My worst birthday, I threw up half the cake," he said, his tone bright. "Guess you've got me beat."

Grateful that they weren't going to deal with any of their outstanding issues just now, Kate nodded her head at the needle in his hand.

"That was quick," she noted.

"I used a flame," Jack informed her, and then turned to Charlie. "May I…?"

Charlie took the hint and got up, giving Jack back his chair, and Jack met Kate's eyes seriously.

"I had an idea, and you can feel free to say no, but it would be really, really good for us to know just how extensive the numbness is."

"But… you already…?" Kate looked at him in confusion.

"Not how far," he clarified. "How deep."

Kate nodded slowly, understanding, but less than thrilled.

"You want to… pierce… my arm."

"Oh, Dude…" Hurley said quietly, sounding a little sickened, but Jack nodded.

"You might be a little sore later, but it shouldn't hurt right now, not if this is really what I think it is."

Kate took a quick moment to think that over, and then nodded.

"Okay. That might actually give us a chance to test the other pill again," she pointed out. "If it's sore, I mean."

"Maybe," Jack agreed, and pulled his chair closer to the bed again. He reached for her arm and gently laid it out in front of him, along her lap. He had a tissue ready to wipe away any droplets of blood.

He pierced her palm first, and although Kate and Charlie watched in mild fascination, Hurley headed for the door.

"I'll, uh, I'll just… I'll be out here," he said weakly, and quickly left.

Charlie smirked, and Kate had to hide a smile.

Same old Hurley.

"You can't feel that?" Jack asked, and Kate shook her head in the negative.

"Not at all."

Jack moved up her arm bit by bit, first piercing the skin lightly and then deeper, and each time looking into her face for a reaction.

When he hit her upper shoulder she winced, and leaned back since she couldn't otherwise pull her arm away.

"Sorry," Jack said quickly, but looked confused. "Earlier you said you couldn't feel that area, so…"

"Guess I wasn't quite accurate," Kate told him, her eyes locked on his, and she hoped she wasn't blushing, remembering why she hadn't exactly been 'quite accurate' earlier.

Charlie looked intrigued by the exchange, but quickly grew bored as Kate resumed her earlier position against the wall and Jack went back to making notes.

"So… s'it all right if I go back out with Hurley?"

"Yeah, Charlie, it's fine," Jack said without looking up, and Charlie wandered away.

The room went silent again for a full minute or two, and when Jack looked up from his notebook and met Kate's eyes, neither of them knew what to say at first.

He fell back into his medical routine, reaching for her good arm to take her pulse.

"Still holding steady," he told her after a moment, and she nodded.

"No darts today," she said with a smile, looking down at her useless arm.

"What, you don't think you can take me left-handed?" Jack teased.

"I wouldn't want to put you through the embarrassment," Kate teased back, and Jack laughed a truly amused laugh.

"As soon as you're back to normal, I'm using the rest of this notebook to keep score," he told her.

Her smile died off slowly as she looked around the room and sighed.

"Jack, I know you think I should stay in the hatch during all of this…" she started.

"It's a controlled environment, Kate, and private, non-chaotic… We've got the guys and the Epipens -"

"I'm _bored_," she said pleadingly, looking him in the eye. "We can have that on the beach!"

"You shouldn't be traipsing around the jungle right now. This is still a foreign drug, and even if it wasn't you could still react to the --"

"Then it's a good thing I'll have my doctor 'traipsing around' with me, right?" Kate tried, smiling a smile she'd known guys to have trouble resisting in the past.

It almost worked. She could see his resolve starting to crack.

And so she pushed on.

"It's what, almost eight-o-clock?" Kate asked, and Jack nodded, not sure where she was going with that question. "So people have had dinner, everyone's probably hanging around a big camp fire right now. If we leave now we'll be there when the sun goes down. You can check on Claire -"

"Sun has been -"

"Sun's not a doctor, though," Kate insisted, and Jack gave her a knowing look.

"You're really going to play the doctor card right now?"

"If it means we go up to the beach? You bet."

Kate grinned at him again, and though he tried, he just plain couldn't resist.

Truth be told, he was beginning to go stir-crazy in the hatch himself. And realistically, there wasn't much more that could go wrong up on the beach than here in the hatch.

He reached out his hand to her, and she took it and stood up.

"Anyone ever tell you you're stubborn?" he asked playfully.

Kate just laughed as she left the room.

…

A half hour later, despite the continued numbness of her arm, Kate was as close to feeling that all was right with the world as she'd been in years.

These little campfires in the evening were by far the best part of their now-settled life on the island.

The setting sun left everything looking slightly orange and glowing, and groups gathered together to share stories and often share fruit, and with all the traumas and tragedies they had all suffered in the past several weeks, it was something they all needed.

Hurley often served as entertainment, comedian extraordinaire that he was.

Presently he was in the middle of some long tale about a squirrel trapped in an apartment, and though Kate wasn't really paying much attention, she cracked a smile whenever everyone else laughed. It was infectious. Even Sayid laughed now and then, laying in the sand next to a snoozing Vincent.

Kate was seated next to Jack on a large log someone had placed next to a regular bonfire pit. Sun and Jin were nearby, as were Rose and Bernard, and the apparently recently reconciled Claire and Charlie, and Kate felt a little bit paired off, coupled up with Jack, sitting next to all of them.

She didn't get up and move, though. She didn't even think about it.

In fact, when the slightest feeling of light-headedness passed over her, she leaned against Jack slightly, and he noticed immediately and turned to face her.

He looked at her uncertainly, wondering if something was wrong or if she was simply getting closer to him for the sake of getting closer to him.

"Little dizzy," she nearly whispered.

Perhaps it was that he'd been expecting this, or perhaps it was that he was just feeling _that _relaxed right now, but Jack didn't look worried. He just put his arm around her as if it was the most natural thing in the world, and slowly, gently moved them both off of the log and onto the sand.

"Lean back against me," he offered, speaking almost as quietly as she had.

She did exactly that, settling in against his chest, and though it felt a little bit new and foreign to her, it also felt right.

That was the thing with her and Jack. Things weren't always good between them, but when they were it was so damn _right_.

She closed her eyes, comfortable and content.

This place was crazy.

But every once in a very long while, there was nowhere else she'd rather be.

…

_Author's (other) note: We've been moving forward slowly and establishing some things, and setting up other things when it comes to Jack and Kate and what he knows of her past, and how he reacts to that. Without giving too much away, this was the last sort of 'set up' chapter. Next up things are going to take a significant turn… _

_Kate is about to get far more than she bargained for with this 'project'. _

_And it just might change everything. _

_Feedback rocks my world!_


	5. Chapter 5

_Author's note: Again, thank you so much for all of the feedback! It's a great inspiration and incentive to write. I would absolutely love to hear from you after this one._

_Oh, and Freckles-101 – Are you psychic, or am I obvious? Cyber props to you! You're on the right track. _

_As always, these characters are not mine… _

**Test Subject**

Chapter Five

For the first time since he and Kate had started working with Desmond's drugs, Jack had no idea what was going on.

And it scared him.

Just a few minutes ago he had injected Kate with a liquid drug labeled with only a number.

It _looked_ a lot like the others that they had been working with, but those had been easily recognizable once they'd started to take effect. Sedatives and anesthetics and mild painkillers… they were all familiar to him.

This was foreign.

He'd done his usual little examination, and it had given him no reason to worry.

But sitting cross-legged on the bed in front of him, Kate looked… drugged.

"Everything okay, Kate?" he asked her, trying to sound casual, and trying to get her to meet his eyes.

"I'm not sure," she answered immediately, and then they were both silent for a moment, as he sat watching her.

"Do you feel… strange?"

"Yeah. And tired. Did you give me another sedative, Jack?"

She looked curious and confused, and he shook his head.

"I don't think so," he answered quietly, hoping she couldn't hear the worry in his tone.

"Jack?" Sayid called from somewhere behind them, and Jack turned to face him and found him closely examining the bottle containing the drug.

"You see something in there that I don't?" Jack asked, rather hopefully, and Sayid looked up and met his eyes.

"Maybe."

Sayid said nothing more, instead just giving Jack a meaningful look.

Jack glanced at Kate again and decided there was no reason that he and Sayid couldn't step out into the hallway for just a moment.

Outside the room, Sayid held up the bottle and nodded his head in Kate's general direction.

"This is all looking eerily familiar to me," Sayid told him, his tone low and secretive.

"Well that makes one of us," Jack replied, rubbing his forehead with his hand in an anxious gesture. "What are you thinking?"

Sayid waited a beat, as though considering.

"At times, when I was working as a communications officer, we tried innovative methods to get the enemy to communicate. One of those methods was Sodium Pentothal."

Jack raised his eyebrows in surprise, recognizing the name.

"So-called 'truth serum'?" Jack questioned.

"Yes."

"You think… Kate…" Jack looked distinctly uncomfortable with the idea. "Are you sure?"

"No," Sayid told him. "But I suspect. She has the look, and… have you ever known Kate to answer a question so quickly and directly?"

"I haven't asked her much," Jack pointed out, and Sayid nodded.

"That is true. I would suggest you ask her something else, then. Something that she might be less likely to answer so freely. I'll be in the computer room."

"Sayid!" Jack called as he began to walk away, and he turned back. "I need to know everything you know about the drug."

Nodding as though he should have realized that, Sayid returned to Jack's side.

"It interferes particularly with judgment, higher cognitive function. Clearly, it makes a person very communicative. You should also consider that usually it is followed by a… a kind of recovery period. The after effects… can be… discomforting."

"Which means what?"

"I've seen disorientation, exhaustion… sometimes lack of balance, even intense nausea."

Jack took that in and nodded, not happy to hear it, but accepting it as a potential inevitability.

"I'll be with her," Jack said, clearly confident that that was all that mattered. "Anything else?"

"Medically, no," Sayid answered.

"Otherwise?"

A tiny, slightly amused smile played with the corners of Sayid's mouth.

"Well, if I'm right about this, she's uninhibited and extremely open to suggestion." He left a beat. "I would suggest not leaving her alone with Sawyer."

Apparently pleased by his own little joke (a joke lost on Jack at the moment), Sayid turned to leave again, and offered one final parting remark.

"If only we'd found this before we captured the man who claimed to be Henry Gale."

With that, Sayid left, and Jack went back in to Kate.

She hadn't moved. Nothing seemed to have changed.

Jack knew exactly what he _wanted_ to ask her, to test Sayid's theory.

It would be so easy.

Just a little phrase or two.

_Tell me about the man you loved. Tell me about the man you killed._

He'd always wanted to know; always hoped it might somehow be less cold-blooded than it had sounded when she'd said it all those days ago; always wished, however privately, that some day, somehow, wanting her - wanting _everything_ with her - would be _simple_ again.

But he heard her earlier words ringing in his head.

"_I didn't say anything, did I?"_

"_Never really liked to feel out of control."_

"_If we come across those painkillers, shoot me."_

Kate would probably prefer poison to truth serum.

She would _hate_ this, if she was more aware.

And yet… he had to ask her _something _significant.

Even if only to find out if Sayid was right.

He sat down next to her bed again, leaned forward, watched her intently.

He settled on a question, something that he had been wondering, something that he knew she normally took care to hide.

Almost as if it could make up for what he was about to do, he reached out and took her hand.

"Kate," he began, his serious tone sounding intense in the otherwise silent room, "When you were sixteen… how did you break your arm?"

Her already confused expression darkened immediately, her eyes clouding over with remembered pain.

"He hit me."

Jack all but gaped at her, startled by the abrupt admission.

"He hit me, and I fell down the stairs," she continued, her far away gaze looking distinctly anxious and troubled now.

It was far more than she would have told him if she'd had the choice.

And he knew it.

He knew he should stop now.

But he needed to ask… needed to know… if for no other reason than so that he didn't have to lie in bed wondering at night…

"Who hit you, Kate?"

"Wayne."

Her expression told him the very name sickened her, and it filled him with a brewing dread.

"Wayne?"

"My step dad," she nearly whispered.

He didn't have the words to respond to that.

He somehow both craved and feared knowing more.

Unable to help himself now, he leaned further forward almost imperceptibly, almost involuntarily, and opened his mouth to ask another question.

"Why did Wayne hit you, Kate?"

"Mom ducked."

_Mom. _

_Ducked._.

It rang in his ears.

And the haunted look in her eyes twisted something deep inside of him.

That was the kind of home she had lived in, wasn't it?

"Kate…" Jack started softly, with no idea how to follow it up.

"Are you mad at me, Jack? For lying before?" she asked worriedly, absurdly.

She looked and sounded so_ vulnerable_, so unlike herself that it was unnerving.

"No, Kate, I'm not mad." He paused, again at a loss for words. He felt like a fish out of water, seeing her like this. "I just… hope that someone took good care of you." he finally finished, telling her what came easily, because anything else was too much to process right now.

Feeling almost as disoriented as Kate looked, Jack was about to end the discussion, and suggest that she just lie down and try to rest.

But then suddenly she volunteered information of her own free will, staring right through him, almost as if she was talking to herself.

"Tom was there."

Something about the way she said it made Jack wonder if this 'Tom' was _the one_.

There was something wistful and careful about the way she said his name.

And Jack had to fight with himself, because he had no right… she would _hate_ him for this… she would be _right_ to hate him for this… and part of him never wanted to know…

But…

"Was it Tom's plane, Kate?"

"Yeah." She spoke quietly. "We… we buried it… in a time capsule…" She smiled softly at the memory. "We were supposed to dig it up later, we were supposed to be married and have nine kids…"

She looked like she might cry at that, and he unconsciously moved closer to her.

"Kate -"

"We almost did."

Jack froze, shook his head slightly in a way that conveyed confusion.

"Almost did what?"

"Not nine, but… we almost had a baby."

Her eyes filled with tears, and he stared at her, his own eyes stunned and sorry and uncertain.

"Almost?" he prompted, though he knew what was coming.

"I lost it," she admitted, and turned her head away from him briefly, looking guilt-ridden, as if it was somehow her own fault, as if it was just another item on the list of things that kept her constantly longing for a redemption she didn't really believe she would ever deserve. "Mom said it was for the best…" She confided, and a lone tear made it's way down her cheek. "_She said that, _Jack," she told him brokenly, her voice catching. "She said we were too young, and that it was for the best, and Wayne said I'd just screw it up anyway…"

She looked positively devastated by the memory of it.

And while he sat there with her, part of him trying to figure out how to offer comfort while another part tried to put all the pieces together, something occurred to him.

"_I only ever got dizzy or faint when I was sick, hurt… whatever."_

That was what she'd said.

And he understood now.

'_Pregnant_' was the '_whatever_' she had carefully kept hidden in that sentence.

"I'm sorry, Kate," he told her quietly, genuinely, and in a sense he meant it more literally than it sounded.

He couldn't look at her when he asked his next question.

"What happened to Tom?"

That broke her, so suddenly that it startled him.

The tears came fast and hard, and she dropped her face into her hands.

And he felt guilty as sin.

"It should have been me… It should have been me, Jack, it should have been me…"

She was _sobbing_ now, and Jack moved onto the edge of the bed and awkwardly reached out his hands, barely touching her arms, looking into her face, almost afraid to touch her.

"Okay, Kate, it's okay… let's not… don't think about this right now. You hear me? We don't need to talk about this right now."

"I should have made him get out of the car…"

"You…" Jack was puzzled, not sure what exactly she meant. "I'm sure you tried," he insisted to her, wondering if she felt she'd killed him because she'd been driving and they'd crashed.

"I should have made him get out of the car, Jack… I knew he could get hurt, and I just drove off…"

"Kate…" Jack started, sitting directly across from her now on the bed, trying to get her watery eyes to meet his. "I'm sure you didn't mean for him to get hurt."

And he _was_ sure now.

That much was clear to him.

"But I didn't stop it," she insisted, looking up at him. "And I started it all… I started it all the night I killed Wayne… if I hadn't done that…"

Her eyes begged him to disagree with her, but Jack just stared at her again, thrown.

_The night I killed Wayne._

How easily the words slipped out of her mouth chilled him.

But that was the big answer, wasn't it?

That was what she'd tried to tell him that early day on the beach.

That was what she'd done.

He must have looked appalled despite his mixed and chaotic feelings, because when she took in the expression on his face, she started clumsily pleading her case.

"You don't understand, Jack, it's not like you think, it's not like they said… I just wanted him to stop… I did hate him, but I also needed him to stop… just to stop, 'cause the police wouldn't help, 'cause Mom wouldn't admit anything… Mom _lied_, she just kept _lying_ for him…" She spat the word 'lying' as if it was a dirty word, which would have been ironic on any other night, coming from her. But tonight, now, in this, it pulled at his heart. "The police wouldn't help, and I had to stop him, Jack… I had to _stop _him… He broke her wrist… and you don't know, you don't know what it's like, when he looks at me like that… you don't know what it's like…"

"It's _okay_…" Jack told her soothingly, and yet almost pleadingly, needing to somehow end this, wanting to right the wrongs that had her so broken, troubled by the fact that she'd slipped into the present tense without even realizing it. "It's okay, Kate, it's okay, because he's gone, and I understand… I understand, okay?"

Emotion threatened to steal his voice, his eyes locked on her face, and he gently took her by the shoulders, and then took her face in his hands, cupping her chin, forcing her to look him in the eye.

"I understand," he said slowly and clearly; promising her quietly but forcefully.

He nodded encouragingly, over and over again, until, _finally_, she nodded back.

And then he wasn't sure if he reached out for her or if she reached out for him, but suddenly she was in his arms.

And she clung to him.

Because this was new for her.

Because no one had _ever_ understood.

He knew that in the light of day this would all be different.

Tomorrow he would have to figure out what this changed for him.

Tomorrow she might hate him for knowing her secrets.

Tomorrow they'd have to face reality.

The exposed truths would complicate things for her.

And simplify things for him.

But at least they were moving forward.

And there was still tonight.

He slowly adjusted them both until they were lying next to each other rather than sitting there together holding on tight, and then he just watched her.

Her eyes were so damn haunted, but there was something grateful there now too, and though he'd left a respectable distance between them (as much as the small bed would allow) he reached into the space between them now and tangled his fingers with hers, reassuring her with just a touch.

He remembered walking away from her that day by the caves, remembered leaving her sobbing over the man she'd loved and killed.

He remembered that he hadn't even given her a chance.

And if he was honest with himself – truly honest – he remembered all the subtle, silent punishments he'd heaped on her since then.

Punishments for falling off the impossibly high pedestal he'd had her on.

He'd been wrong.

And he was sorry.

But he knew it all now.

And he wasn't going anywhere this time.

…


	6. Chapter 6

_Author's note: Thanks again for all the wonderful reviews! This story wasn't even supposed to **have** six chapters in my original outline, but you guys have got me turning this thing into something much more longterm, and I love where it's going, and I hope you will too. _

_As always, the characters aren't mine, and feedback would be so very, very much appreciated. _

**Test Subject**

Chapter Six

Jack barely slept all night.

Around five-o-clock in the morning he was still wide awake, still lying there watching Kate sleep, still afraid of what was to come when she woke up.

Last night she'd looked at him like he was her hero.

This morning she probably wouldn't even look him in the eye.

The effects of the drug would be gone when she woke up. He was pretty sure of that.

And she would probably be angry.

And what could he say to that? He _had_ taken advantage of the situation, to a point.

Still, he couldn't regret it completely.

He knew her now. Like he never had before.

And he finally knew that the things in her past that seemed so incongruous to who she was now weren't really so incongruous at all.

She was capable of violence. That was true.

But she had to be pushed to horrific limits first.

And that made sense to him. That was who she was now, too.

And who she was now was someone he just might be falling in love with.

Even if he wasn't ready to say it out loud.

As Jack lay there thinking these thoughts and waiting for Kate to wake up, suddenly Sayid poked his head into the room.

Jack sat up quickly, startled, and got off the bed slowly, careful to avoid waking Kate.

He'd forgotten that Sayid was even down here in the hatch with them.

They stepped out into the hallway, much as they'd done last night.

"I did not want to intrude last night," Sayid explained quietly. "But I was hoping I could go back to the beach."

"Yeah. Yeah, Sayid, I'm sorry, I got all caught up in..." Jack thought for a moment and then just shook his head, not sure quite how to put what had happened last night into words.

"Was I right, Jack?" Sayid asked curiously, and Jack nodded after a moment.

"Yeah. You were right."

Sayid smiled a little knowing smile.

"And Kate isn't going to like that."

"No, Kate isn't going to like that," Jack agreed, and rubbed his eyes tiredly.

"You remember what I told you about after effects?" Sayid questioned, and Jack nodded, and then reiterated what he'd told him last night.

"I'll be with her."

Jack meant what he said.

He had every intention of staying with Kate until she was back to normal, whether she wanted him there or not.

But unfortunately for them both, when Sayid had gone back to the beach and Jack returned to the bedroom and took up the same position as before on the edge of the bed, sleep finally found him.

…

When Kate woke she had to struggle up from the depths of a deep sleep and into a reality that felt something like the world's worst hangover.

Her foggy mind tried to process that, confused because she had no memory of doing any drinking, and when she turned and spotted Jack fast asleep next to her it threw her, and she jerked back away from him, so quickly and effectively that she fell right out of the bed and onto floor, adding a sore back to her throbbing head.

She fought with her memory, tried to clear her head, noted carefully that they were both fully clothed.

She made a feeble attempt to get to her feet, and managed to do so only by gripping the edge of the doorframe and then leaning against it once she was standing upright.

She was rubbing her back where it had hit the side of the bed and then the ground when somehow, even through the dizziness, her memory started to clear.

She literally froze, and her breath came quicker as she stared at Jack's sleeping face.

_He knew_.

He knew it all.

It left her feeling so raw, so exposed, so _vulnerable_.

Standing there with the room seemingly swimming around her, all she was sure of was that she couldn't be there when he woke up.

She couldn't face him right now.

She needed to get away.

And so she did what she had to do, all but stumbling out into the living area, and then toward the air lock door, and then out into the jungle.

She didn't know where she was going.

But if it was away from Jack, it was good enough.

…

Jack tore threw the jungle mere minutes after waking up, silently cursing himself.

He should have been able to stay awake, or he should have asked Sayid to stick around until Kate herself woke up, or he should have…

He should have done _something_.

The only sound was of his own shoes crunching leaves and twigs, and he stopped in a clearing and looked around, turning in a full circle as he did.

Visions of a disoriented Kate falling into a pond or out of a tree plagued his thoughts.

But when he finally found her, he quickly realized he had other, more realistic problems to deal with.

She was leaning heavily against a tall tree, looking anxious and distressed. When she heard him and looked up and met his eyes she tore her gaze away quickly, and looked ready to bolt.

"Relax, okay?" he called to her, and slowly made his way toward her. "Just relax, Kate. It's okay."

"I don't want to do this today, Jack," Kate told him, trying to force anger into her shaky voice because 'angry' was so much less pathetic than 'afraid'.

"We don't have to do anything, all right. Just let me -"

"No." She didn't let him finish, just denied whatever he was about to ask. "No, I don't have to 'let you' do anything."

"Kate, I'm still your doctor. The only doctor here. And you don't look okay."

"I feel hung over. I'll survive."

Willing her body to cooperate, Kate shoved herself away from the tree and took a few relatively stable steps, distancing herself from Jack.

"I don't get it, Kate," Jack called to her, following her slowly, and sounding truly confused, and frustrated.

Reluctantly, she turned to look at him.

"Does this have to be so bad?" He asked. "What is it about being honest with me that's so horrible?"

"You're seriously asking me that?" She asked him, as though it was a ridiculous question, and he nodded as he approached her, stopping just a few feet away.

"Yeah, I am. I might have gone too far last night, asked more than I had a right to -"

"Might have!"

"Yeah, might have. But this whole drug testing thing was your idea, and you did a lot of talking on your own last night, and as far as I can tell this should make things easier for us, not harder."

"Easier for _you_," she clarified, looking vaguely bitter, and he shook his head.

"Easier for _us_." He paused, looked at her for a moment, confusion written all over his face. "Why is it so bad that I know you're not who that mug shot makes you out to be?"

Kate fixed a glare on the ground next to him, her jaw clenched.

She hadn't wanted to do this today.

But it didn't look like he was going to give her much of a choice.

"You want to know why, Jack?" she asked, and gave him no time to reply before she continued. "Because of that look."

"That -" he started to question her, but she cut him off.

"_That_ look," she said, nodding at him as if she meant his current expression. "The one that says that _right now_, for _today_, you like what you see in me. That look that says you think it's all going to be all right now."

Jack just stared at her for a moment, absorbing what she'd said.

He did want it to all be all right for them now. And it bothered him that she didn't seem to think that was possible.

Kate took another step toward him, stronger now, and her stony eyes met his confused ones.

"You don't get to want me _now_, Jack. You don't get to keep pulling me in or pushing me away depending on how close or how far I am from that image of me you have in your head."

"That's not what I -"

"Isn't it?"

She held his gaze, challenging him to disagree, and he said nothing for a moment, considering that what she was saying wasn't necessarily too far from the truth.

Or at least it hadn't been, before last night.

But last night had changed everything.

"No, it's not," he told her firmly. "Because for better or for worse, Kate, I got to see the real you last night. And she wasn't so far from what I thought she was in the beginning."

"You think because you gave me some drug and learned a few things about my past you know who I am?" Kate asked him sharply.

Jack hesitated, thrown by the venom in her voice.

She took yet another step toward him, and leaned in close, dropped her voice to a taunting whisper.

"I murdered my father in his sleep. I left the man I loved bleeding to death in the front seat of his car. The last time my own mother set eyes on me she screamed for help. I attacked enough police officials that I don't know any more exactly how many of them there have been. I've had more aliases than I can remember, too. I screwed some lazy jackass from New Mexico and let him beat me up just so that he'd help me rob a bank, and then I shot him. And two others. Right there in the bank vault. In cold blood."

She leaned back, watched his face, her eyes silently daring him not to react to all of that.

"That's the real me, Jack," she told him, with just the slightest hint of moisture in her eyes. "And you made it pretty clear a long time ago, you don't want her."

Kate turned and started walking away, willing her hands to stop shaking, wondering what the hell she'd just done.

Jack's voice called out from several feet behind her.

"I don't buy it."

Kate stopped in her tracks, but didn't turn around.

"I don't know why you're trying so hard to push me away right now, but I don't buy it."

Kate slowly turned and looked at him. She looked just a little bit uncertain now, but shrugged and shook her head anyway.

"It's not for you to buy, Jack. It happened. It's over." She paused, beginning to look weary. Her head was still pounding. And the fact that she couldn't bear to look Jack in the eye right now didn't make destroying any future relationship between them any easier. "I'm done, Jack," she told him, shaking her head. "I'm just done."

"I'm not," he told her. "See, Kate, I know about your dad, or step-dad, or whoever the hell he was to you. I get that. I know about Tom, too. I know enough. And this bank thing?" He seemed at a loss for words for a moment, and then it was his turn to step closer to her. "Why'd you shoot them, Kate?"

Kate said nothing, avoiding his eyes.

"Come on, Kate. Come on, you say that's who you are, you think you have all the answers, back it up. Why'd you shoot three men in a New Mexico bank?"

Kate turned her eyes up to meet his, but her head never moved.

Her eyes were narrowed into a glare.

"Why'd you shoot them? Why'd you do it?"

"You can go to hell, Jack," Kate muttered, and tried to turn and walk away, but he caught her by the arm.

"You had to do it, didn't you?" Jack demanded, his tone harsh. "What'd they do, Kate? How'd they make you do it?"

"Let go of my -"

"What did they do? Did they -"

"They were going to shoot the manager, all right!" Kate yelled at him. "Is that what you wanted to hear? They were going to shoot some poor man and I told them if they tried to shoot him I'd shoot them first. You satisfied now?"

Jack _did_ look satisfied, and for some reason even Kate didn't fully understand, that made her want to cry.

He let go of her arm, and they stood there, because neither one of them was ready to walk away.

After a moment he reached for her arm again, but he was gentle this time. His fingers slid down her forearm to her hand, and she stubbornly pulled it out of his reach.

He stood waiting, knowing she'd look at him sooner or later, and when she did his eyes were soft and sorry, and his voice was tender when he spoke.

"You're not the monster you think you are, Kate."

"I'm not the hero you want me to be, either," she told him, fighting tears now.

His eyes silently screamed at her that he didn't understand, he just didn't get what was going on, and after several seconds passed she took pity on him, and decided to fill in the blanks.

"It would be so easy, Jack. It would be so, so easy to be who you want me to be. For a little while. But I'd screw it up." She laughed a sad little laugh and shrugged her shoulders. "Sooner or later, I'd screw it up."

He shook his head a bit at that, but he still looked less than clear on what she was trying to say, so she continued.

"I know what happens after that, Jack. I know what happens when we get close and then I disappoint you."

Her eyes were so pained, and there was so much truth behind what she was saying.

And he couldn't look her in the eye for a long moment after that.

"I'm not perfect, Kate. I do get that, contrary to what some people around here seem to think."

She was the one who didn't quite get what he was trying to say now, and he took a deep breath and went on.

"Sawyer… He brings out the superiority complex in me," Jack admitted. "And… I know sometimes you catch the wrong end of that. But I'm telling you now, Kate, I know a little something about screwing up. I screwed up my relationship with my parents, my relationship with my wife… my relationship with you."

"You're not the one who kissed me and ran away," Kate said quietly, looking out into the rows of trees behind him.

They were both silent for a moment.

"You were right, that day in the jungle," Jack said suddenly, and Kate looked up, surprised, and when he realized how it sounded he shook his head. "The day of… the day with the net. Damaged goods, both of us."

She vaguely remembered saying that, and didn't disagree with him.

"We've got so much baggage we can hardly see each other half the time," he told her, a hint of desperation and sheer emotion creeping into his tone. "And I figure maybe that's why you ran away, that day in… that other day, in the jungle."

She didn't disagree with him here, either.

And so, almost without thinking, he made a decision, to tell her everything.

Maybe she deserved that, after last night.

"But the thing is, Kate, I want you," he told her matter-of-factly. "I've always wanted you. And yeah, after last night, it's easier for me to accept that. And I don't think that's so wrong, to be sure because I know the truth now. And I don't just want you for…" He stopped for a moment, trying to find the words, and stepped closer to her, until they were nearly close enough to touch. "I want everything. I'm not just looking for us to keep doing this companions, partners, first-and-second-in-command thing. And I'm not just looking for sex. And I'm not just looking for a friend. I want all of it, all of you. I want everything."

He stopped again, and he was the vulnerable one now, searching her face for a reaction.

She lost the battle with her tears suddenly, and turned her face away from him.

"It's not that easy, Jack." There was a note of warning in her tone, and she paced a few steps one way, and then paced back. "Acknowledging that we're both screwed up doesn't make that go away."

"I'm just saying -"

"I don't have some big eloquent statement," she told him, cutting him off. "I can't even hear myself think right now," she added, reminding him for the first time in a while that she _was_ still likely feeling some after effects from the drug.

"I'm not looking for a big -"

"All I know is that I liked this last week." She cut him off again, needing to say what she had to say. "Dinners and darts and curling up by the fire and falling asleep listening to you breathe… It all felt good. Right. Like it's supposed to be. And I don't even think I believe in fate."

They were both silent for a long moment then, their eyes locked in an intense, shared gaze.

They were standing close.

So close.

It wouldn't have taken much for him to lean in and kiss her.

And he wanted to kiss her.

Badly.

But there was still something so uncertain in her eyes.

He couldn't stand the thought of her taking off again afterwards.

And so he waited.

"I've been on my own for a long time, Jack," she finally said in a little voice that was barely more than a whisper, her eyes on his chest rather than his face.

"I know," he acknowledged with a little nod that nearly brought their foreheads into contact.

"And the last guy who dared to really care about me ended up with a bullet in him."

"Won't happen here," he told her softly.

"And I _will_ disappoint you, sooner or later."

"I'm not so sure about that."

"And if we're… if we're together… it doesn't give you any right to try tell me what to do."

"I would never -"

"Even when you think it's for my own good."

He hesitated for only a moment.

"Okay," he agreed.

"And I can't promise that I'm going to be good at dealing with you knowing everything. I like to try to forget, try to pretend…" She let her voice trail off for a moment. "It's all a little too real when it's not just in my head."

"Kate, we don't have to ever talk about it again."

She finally raised her eyes to his face then.

She had one last thing to share before she could give in.

One last warning. One last thing he'd have to accept.

"I can't pretend I was never attracted to Sawyer."

It was this that finally got to him, and he leaned back away from her just a bit, his eyes looking troubled, and a little wounded.

He took a step back, looked away from her.

"We've come this far, might as well go all the way, with the honesty thing," Kate told him.

If he couldn't deal with this truth now, she wasn't going to get close to him and wait for it to blow up between them later.

"He flattered me," she continued. "Made me feel good when you made me feel bad. And he is a kind of friend to me. And I figure he'll stay that way."

Jack took several deep breaths, working through it all in his mind.

When he looked back at her, he opened his mouth to ask a question, but couldn't quite find the words to form a full phrase.

"You say… when you say 'attracted'…" He paused. "Physically?"

Kate looked at him, not sure she wanted to answer that.

But like she'd just said, they'd come this far.

"Some days," she admitted, and Jack looked disheartened, even though it was something he suspected so strongly he basically already knew.

His gaze hit the ground, and when he looked up again his eyes were full of a painful blend of hope and dread.

"More than me?" he asked, consciously forcing his voice to be strong and firm, forcing his eyes to stay dry, needing to keep that much of his dignity intact.

She stared at him for a moment.

Tears came to her eyes.

And then she finally shook her head back and forth from side to side, so slowly that he thought at first that he was imagining it.

She closed the distance between them, slowly taking back the steps he'd taken a moment ago, and their eyes met for just a moment before hers drifted closed - and she kissed him.

Her lips were tentative against his for just a second before they both gave in to it completely, because they could now, because, finally, there was nothing holding them back.

When they finally broke apart they _barely_ broke apart, and she pressed her forehead against his while she caught her breath, and after a moment it seemed it was his turn to kiss her, and he did.

This time it wasn't so much about the emotion that was in it, but rather about something to simply be enjoyed, and their mouths played and explored, and her hands naturally found their way to his shoulders and then his neck and then his face and then his chest, while his, somehow or other, found their way to her waist.

He let the kiss linger, and when they broke apart again she was dizzy again, and she wasn't sure the after effects of the drug were entirely to blame.

They stood there for a long moment in the little clearing, neither of them really sure what to do now.

"Let's have dinner tonight," Jack said quietly, breaking the silence.

"We've had dinner together every night for almost a week," she pointed out with a smile, but she liked the idea, too.

"Not in the hatch… We can find some little spot on the beach."

"You asking me on a date, Jack?" she teased, and then felt a little bit awkward, realizing that 'a date' was essentially what it would be.

"You can call it whatever you want to call it," he said, smiling down at the ground.

He took her hand after a moment and started pulling her gently along the path back toward the hatch.

And it was strange but precious when she realized he wasn't going to let go.

…


	7. Chapter 7

_Author's note: I apologize to those of you who sent me a private message and haven't gotten a reply yet. I've had a crazy busy week and wanted to put whatever time I had into writing this. _

_As always, thank you SO much for all of the fabulous reviews! I have to say, this story was originally supposed to be some little three or four chapter thing that didn't really go anywhere particularly special. I just liked the idea of Kate volunteering for this and being Jack's patient for a while. _

_You guys and your enthusiasm made me want to turn it into something more substantial, and it's been a great little ride. I debated about whether to continue this here or start the rest of what I have planned as a sequel, and I've decided on a sequel. I think it's just more fitting that way, given the decision Jack and Kate make at the end of this chapter. _

_So this is the end of Test Subject, but keep an eye out for what I've got tentatively titled '**Consequential Encounters**'. It shouldn't be **too** long before I get started on that, and I'm rather excited about it, so I hope you'll all give it a chance. This last chapter of this story almost functions as a prologue for the sequel, in some ways. _

_Without teasing too much (I hope!) I'll just say that I've gotten intrigued by the fact that consequential comes from 'consequences' and means both 'significant' and 'resulting'… meaning that every significant encounter has its consequences, good or bad… and one incident usually results in another, somewhere along the line… and so on and so forth… _

_I have plans for Jack and Kate to have various encounters with… well… each other, and the Others, and some people we've met but they haven't, and some substances they'll wish they never encountered at all… and someone else I can't quite mention yet. _

_One other thing – I realize Kate has said she's a vegetarian, but we've also seen her eat bacon, and many vegetarians do eat fish, so… I don't think it's out of character for her to eat fish. _

_As always, these characters are not mine, and I would so, so very much appreciate any and all feedback. _

**Test Subject**

Chapter Seven

Kate Austen was not a woman who had a lot of dating experience.

In fact, she had almost none at all.

She'd be in love, she'd been married, she'd had a few different sexual partners… and yet somehow, _dating_ had never really been a part of her life.

She'd fallen for her childhood best friend as soon as she was old enough to know what love was. She'd married him, divorced him and soon after began living as a fugitive from justice.

Typical Friday night dinner-and-a-movie experiences with a potential new boyfriend had just never happened for her.

_Dating_ was a foreign concept.

And yet here she was, in an underground bunker on a bizarre deserted island, prepared for what could only be called a _date_ with a man who less than twenty-four hours ago had learned all of her most closely held secrets.

Given all of that, while she was anticipating the evening and eagerly waiting for Jack to return from checking on Claire, she also felt just the slightest bit nervous. She told herself she didn't, but the nerves were there.

It was all so new, and she and Jack had such a history of destroying anything good between them before it had a chance to grow.

She wasn't kidding herself. She fully expected to screw it up sooner or later. The capacity to destroy was something that lived in her DNA, and even if that hadn't been true, she hadn't been kidding when she told Jack she couldn't 'dig in'.

'Forever' just wasn't something she was good at, even when she wanted to be.

But for however long she could make this last, she was damn well going to enjoy it.

She hadn't dressed up or done anything particularly special with her hair, and she wore no makeup, as per usual. Doing anything beyond showering and pulling on clean clothes and brushing her hair just would have felt strange to them both. They were cooking fish over an open fire on the beach, after all, not going to an opera.

And truth be told, Kate had never been one to enjoy dressing up, anyway.

Resting on the couch in the main living area of the hatch, she let her mind wander, wondering where it would all go from here, wondering what being together in this crazy place would mean… and wondering what Jack was like in bed, and when she'd get to find out.

She doubted it would be long before they crossed that line. It had been so long for them both, and the emotional intimacy was there now.

She was mildly concerned by the fact that he likely had a very limited number of condoms in this place, but it was a bridge they'd cross if they came to it.

There was no way she'd risk propagating Wayne's DNA.

Kate was lost in thoughts of just how long it would take to build a more private shelter than either of them had when Jack finally arrived out of nowhere.

She stood up quickly, smiled, and prayed she wasn't blushing.

"Hey."

"Hey."

They looked at each other for a brief, awkward moment, smiling little smiles they couldn't quite subdue, and then he took another step closer to her and leaned in for a quick greeting kiss.

It was new and different and exciting, these little moments they'd shared all day.

And so damn precious, after all of this time.

They said nothing for a long moment, and then Kate remembered where he had been.

"How's Claire?"

"She's good," Jack told her, looking pleased. "Thanks to you, she's really good. That third drug of yours is doing the trick."

Kate nodded and smiled a thin smile, allowing herself a moment to feel good about that.

"You hungry?" Jack asked casually, flinging his backpack down onto the couch.

"Starved! I've barely eaten anything today."

"You're not still feeling sick, are you?" He asked quickly, looking her over.

Kate shook her head, once again unable to completely hide a little smile, loving the way his eyes narrowed when he was concerned… loving that she _knew_ the way his eyes narrowed when he was concerned.

"Just wanted to be hungry for dinner."

"Oh." He nodded, satisfied with that, and then glanced at his watch. "I've got Jin catching us dinner, gave him a pile of mangoes in exchange. Give me two minutes to shower and change," he told her, heading for the bathroom.

"You can shower and change in two minutes?" Kate asked doubtfully, and Jack turned and gave her a teasing grin.

"I'm a man, Kate. Watch me."

Jack took three steps before what he'd just said hit him, and then froze and turned back.

Kate had to bite her lip to keep from laughing at the expression on his face.

"I, uh… that wasn't really an invitation," Jack clarified unnecessarily.

"Clear on that, Jack," Kate told him with a quick nod, and he turned and walked off down the hall.

Kate sat back down on the couch to wait, vaguely aware that it had been a long time since she'd done this much smiling, vaguely amused that Jack had traded mangoes for a fish dinner.

Funny how even here, somehow the man ended up 'paying' for the meal.

Kate made a mental note not to let him make a habit of that.

…

Maybe it was the comfortably warm evening, maybe it was the gentle wind against her face, maybe it was the company…

But Kate had never tasted fish so good.

They'd met up with Jin just long enough to take two large fish from him and offer him their thanks, and then made their way down the beach, around a bend, near the rest of their camp but secluded enough to be alone for a while.

It hadn't taken long to get a fire going or get their fish cleaned and cooked, and now he watched, amused, as she wasted no time in eating her share.

"You have a hollow leg I don't know about?" he kidded her, and watched as she blushed even as she continued chewing.

"I told you I was hungry," she pointed out after a moment, and then added, "And I don't _do_ delicate little lady."

"Wouldn't have it any other way," he replied, rather softly, and she smiled down at the fish for a moment, and then almost shyly raised her eyes to meet his.

They were across from each other, reclined in the sand, a few feet from their fire.

It was just about dusk, and they couldn't have asked for anything more from nature than the bright pink sky above.

"I've been thinking about Rousseau and her traps," he said suddenly, and Kate looked at him quizzically, wondering why he was bringing that up _right now_.

"And…?" she prompted, curious.

"Well," he started, a smile in his eyes even as he tried to keep a straight face. "I've been thinking I need to find her, talk to her about dismantling them. Might mean a day or two trekking into the jungle. And you know, it just wouldn't be smart to go alone. And I could really use a decent tracker." He stopped, and grinned, and added: "And you're a hell of a lot prettier than Locke is."

This time their locked gaze held as she smiled an appreciative but slightly embarrassed little smile, and he smiled widely, nearly laughing at his own little joke.

"You can count me in," she told him a second later, and he nodded.

He'd expected nothing else.

He'd already started looking forward to it.

They were quiet for a long while after that, hearing only indistinct voices and murmurs from down the beach, appreciating the peacefulness of it like they hadn't ever really bothered to before, because it had never been like _this_ before.

When she'd finished with her food she got up to get the bottle of water she had left on the other side of the fire, and she had to walk by him on her way back to where she'd been sitting.

He caught her hand as she went by, and looked at her with a subtle, distant request in his eyes.

She was more than willing to let him pull her down next to him, but surprised when he instead pulled her right into his lap.

They'd never been that close before, but she had no desire to pull away.

In fact, at that moment, all she wanted in the world was to get closer.

They both knew only too well that there were forty-some people chattering away just around the bend.

But that didn't mean he couldn't kiss her, he reasoned to himself.

And it didn't stop them from deepening the kiss, either. Nor did it stop her from teasing his tongue with her own, or stop him from tangling his fingers in her hair.

There was a lot of that kind of thing for a short while, and it wasn't until his hands began a slow journey up under her shirt that she forced herself to pull back from him, and still his hands with her own.

"Jack…" she drew in an uneven breath, gave him a regretful look.

He sighed, closed his eyes, nodded.

They were still for just a moment, and then she moved herself off of him, and onto the sand next to him instead, leaving a few inches of space between them because she knew that to sit any closer would be playing with fire.

Neither of them said anything for a few long moments, until finally he sighed audibly again.

"I need a better tent," he muttered, and she almost laughed at the frustration that underlined his otherwise matter-of-fact tone.

She leaned toward him, risked just a kiss.

"Soon," she promised, her eyes studying his, knowing that they'd never been nearly this open with each other before, and yet entirely comfortable with what she was saying now.

He nodded in agreement.

"Soon."

They went silent again for a long while, both of them fighting with themselves in an attempt to get back to a mental place that let them _just relax_ together.

A distraction was in order, and he'd been meaning to ask her anyway…

"Are we done with the drugs, Kate?"

She turned to face him, startled by the abrupt question, and thought it over for a moment.

"There weren't many left, were there?" she asked

"Three," he answered her. "All of them intravenous."

She turned her eyes out toward the waves, looking unsure.

"We've got painkillers now," she said quietly.

"Painkillers, sedatives, local anesthetic… even a kind of truth serum if we ever get the chance to use it on one of them," Jack listed.

There was something rather hopeful in both of their voices, and they could hear it in each other.

"I'm willing to keep going, if you want to," Kate said, even quieter than before, hating the thought of it, but hating the thought of caving to fear even more.

"I think we're done, Kate," Jack told her meaningfully, and then let another moment pass in silence. "Let's just be done."

She looked back from the waves to his face and found him looking over at her.

She nodded almost imperceptibly, and suddenly he looked as relieved as she felt.

They didn't say it out loud, but the sentiment behind the decision hung in the air between them, so real that it could have been written in the sand.

_There was just too much to lose now_.

She shifted over closer to him in the sand, now that the mood had changed so completely, and leaned back against him as she'd done a few days ago by the group bonfire. This time he wrapped his arms around her tightly from behind, pulling her to him, silently relishing the fact that there was no reason not to do things like that now.

The group bonfire was going on now, by the sound of it. Laughter traveled over from down the beach every now and then, and Hurley's booming, animated voice suddenly became distinguishable over all others.

And though Jack didn't really feel like moving, he felt he had to make an offer, because Kate never looked more relaxed and at peace than when she was lying by the fire listening to everyone laugh at Hurley's stories.

"You want to go over there?"

He could _feel_ Kate sigh, and then shake her head.

"Not yet."

He was content with that, and they sat there together for a long time, until the sky was black rather than pink, and their fire was burning low.

It was crazy, to think back at what had brought them here.

He'd betrayed his father.

She'd killed hers.

It had landed them both in Australia, and then aboard a doomed flight.

And they'd met, that day in the jungle, as if by fate.

And maybe it was all fate, because it all seemed to be coincidences from there on in.

If Ethan hadn't taken Claire, if Boone and Locke hadn't been searching for her and found the hatch, if Rousseau's traps hadn't injured Claire, if Sayid hadn't been down there to recognize the truth drug…

Maybe they wouldn't have made it here. At least not so soon.

The chain of events reached way back, one encounter leading to another.

There was no telling where it would all go, what consequences awaited them now that they were united in this crazy place.

But here they were.

Together.

And it was _right_.

So very, very right.


End file.
